Hope
by q-siam
Summary: He wears his name like a shirt. Devon/Sterling Slash Oneshot Bronx Masquerade


God doesn't really figure into Jump Shot's life.

Devon isn't really Jump Shot, though. Jump Shot is what the basketball team sees when they look at him, the person people stare at like the world is coming to an end when he enters a library.

There's a couple people who know Devon, not just Jump Shot.

He was surprised when he found this out. Janelle was one. Eventually, it kind of became like his whole class got to know him. What really surprised him, though, was Sterling.

The kid didn't really care about fitting in. Devon envied him for that. He kinda talked to anyone and a lot of people liked talking to him (although there were the people who were creeped out by the overly-religious thing, so not everyone) and that's not something Devon would have expected. He'd always just shaped himself the way people expected him to be, the basketball guy, the dumb jock, because he's seen people that don't and he's never seen them with friends.

Sterling has friends. And they aren't just the religious kids or his family (which is weird to Devon; he doesn't want to imagine having to face his family at school, too), but just other kids, kids who are usually like Devon. Kids who hang out with people they have things in common with, but also, Devon found out, to Sterling.

He seemed kind of like an image. Not really there, because it was hard for Devon to believe that he was, that he could be, that someone like that could be here. Not in this town. Good things didn't seem to exist here. And Sterling was definitely a good thing.

It was easy to maintain this illusion, because while Sterling would talk to anyone, he couldn't talk to everyone and Devon wasn't one of the lucky few.

But then the Open Mike thing started and everyone was talking to everyone and somehow Sterling and Devon just came together like a force was pulling them that way. Devon stared in anticipation for the millisecond that stretched for months inside Devon's head as Sterling turned to him for the first time, opened his mouth and spoke. He didn't know what he expected but he felt like it should have been world-changing. Actually, it just kind of slipped into his life. Sterling acted like he'd always been there, like he belonged there, and Devon couldn't help but agree.

And Sterling talks to anyone, but he doesn't send them looks from across the cafeteria everyday.

Devon feels special and he doesn't mean to, hates getting his hopes up and doesn't want to even begin to contemplate what this means. So, he doesn't. He thinks about everything else instead. And he's a little bit startled to find himself already pushing out of the mold set for him, deciding to be himself instead of Jump Shot.

*

Sterling life is all about God.

Devon's a little disturbed to find just how much of an influence Sterling has in his life.

It's like he wakes up one day and realizes that everything he's doing is prompted by a voice in the back of his head, a voice, he notices, that sounds exactly like Sterling. Not just the tone, but the things it says. Maybe, Devon thinks (but doesn't want to admit), it might just be a little bit because he wants to impress Sterling.

Sterling won't be impressed, though, he doesn't think. Pleased, maybe. Serenely glad. Devon kind of feels like Sterling is beyond that kind of thing, succumbing to peer pressures and craving acceptance.

He's wrong.

It Open Mike Fridays (again) that make him realize it.

Sterling comes up for the first time. His poem, D-Train, is impressive. Like, crazy good if Devon is honest with himself. Actually, they're all good, everyone's poems, but Devon doesn't think it's his partiality to Sterling that makes him like this poem so much. He can relate. He can't relate to most of the girls' poems. They're all about not liking how they look and Devon doesn't really have that kind of issue. But this, he gets. And more than that he realizes that he's been putting Sterling on too high a pedestal. He's not perfect. That's what the poem is saying. He really gets that.

And he believes it, because Sterling is human and humans just aren't perfect but try as he might (and he certainly tried a lot after that poem) he can't find any flaws there. Not like he can find in himself.

*

His parents have never gone to Church, but he thinks he might start when he sees Sterling on his guitar.

It's not the first time he's seen it. The kid has crazy talent and if Devon weren't so happy to just get to hear it he'd probably be really jealous. Devon's got talent. He's got basketball. That's about it, basically everything his life has been until now.

Which sucks, because now it's not his whole life but there isn't much else there. Now he's got poetry and books but he never wanted that to be much. He's interested and he wanted to be able to do whatever it was that he wanted to do. But there isn't much he wants to do and that's painfully clear now that he can do anything.

But he likes having the freedom anyway and he looks to Sterling for guidance without realizing it.

*

Sterling lives pretty far away and his Church is even farther.

Devon's parents don't drive him. He takes the bus and it takes about an hour. He doesn't get back until the A.M. sometimes. Sterling lives pretty close, maybe thirty minutes walking and he doesn't even have to walk so he stays late and plays his guitar and Devon doesn't want to miss a second so he waits. His parents got mad the first couple of times. They don't seem to really care anymore.

Sterling gets along pretty well with everyone.

He doesn't talk to Devon here, though.

The first time Devon showed up, Sterling's eyes caught his and his face lit up like the neon lights in the city and Devon still can't bring himself to regret coming here, even when his parents are angry or disappointed.

But Sterling knows everyone here and Devon doesn't know anyone but Sterling. He kind of gets the feeling the Sterling is running the show here. Everyone comes to him for just about everything.

The sense of pride Devon get from the is kind of inexpilacable. He tells himself it doesn't have anything to do with him, but there it is, like a nugget of warmth resonating through his chest and it makes him smile in spite of everything.

It doesn't stop him from feeling lonely.

*

One day, Devon realizes he has more faith in Sterling than in God.

It kind of just slides into place in his life. It's not so much that it all happens at once as it is that he realizes at once that it's been happening for a while. In the halls, in the cafeteria, during Open Mike and always at church his eyes follow Sterling, lock onto him like the world is dimmed or sometimes just dark in the middle of all of it, ever-present and always shining is Sterling there to guide him.

He remembers thinking Sterling urged him to do some things or make some decisions. He doesn't know anymore how to do things without thinking about what Sterling would want.

Only, now, he thinks it's more than that and he's not ready to think about what.

*

Sterling is crying when he finally kisses Devon.

Devon isn't sure why there's a "finally" in that sentence. Doesn't know how long he's been waiting for this or when this became what he was looking for from the smaller boy. It's kind of devastating to see that the person who slowly but surely became the center of his world is so shaken. The ground is less firm and Devon feels a little dizzy but tries to stand straight and steady anyway.

Because even if he hadn't known it, that's what Sterling had been doing for Devon and now Devon had to return the favor, not because Sterling wanted him to but because he needed him to, the same way Devon had needed Sterling.

Sterling talks to Devon. He talks himself up until he's pacing and red faced and near tears again and Devon just talks him right back down until he's calm and sitting in Devon's arms and his breathing is sounding a little closer to normal. There are a lot of problems, Sterling tells him and Devon is ashamed of himself for not seeing them but that not what Sterling means when he says it and Devon knows that. He tells him about how he was feeling for Devon and the things the people at his church had sayed about gays to his sunday school when he was younger and the looks he's seen people get when they were out. He tells him that he's actually having a lot of trouble believing recently and that's never happened before. He's never had any trouble. And Devon comforts him with words about God he hadn't known he'd believed, hadn't even known that he'd known until he feels better and gives Devon a chaste kiss on the lips and a small but sincere smile.

*

Devon had realized a little later that he did have faith in God, because his faith in Sterling was limitless and Sterling believed.


End file.
